Dr Sunil Sunil of Coonamble NSW is the first general practitioner to complete the Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine’s Competent Authority Pathway assessment for general practice.

The assessment process for this pathway was developed by ACRRM to enable eligible international medical graduates with limited registration working in general practice to qualify for general registration.

“Being in supervised practice on this assessment pathway has motivated me to set educational goals,” Dr Sunil explains. “I completed several up-skilling courses during the last year and the comprehensive report of the multi-source feedback have given me great insight in to my strengths and weakness. “I made great improvements with these recommendations and suggestions.

Dr Sunil, who practiced as a rural generalist for eight years in New Zealand before moving to Australia in 2010, said his next step is to train for fellowship.

“I totally enjoy my current job as a Rural Generalist,” he said. “It gives me immense professional satisfaction. I am happy to say that we get good support from our specialist colleagues, which makes a big difference to patient management.”

Dr Sunil’s practice is in Coonamble NSW, about 550 km north-west of Sydney. The district population of about 4,000 – about 25 per cent of whom are Aboriginal – is served by five doctors in two practices. The local hospital has 20 beds, including eight acute, and four emergency beds. The hospital has teleconferencing facilities for consulting with specialists in Orange, about 300 km to the south.

He sees 30 to 40 patients a day in his GP clinic with ‘an interesting and challenging case mixture’. Dr Sunil says that, ‘as in any other country town, we manage a wide spectrum of patients, and get to know about their psycho-social dynamics, which I think enables us to be better practitioners’. 

“I cannot see myself anywhere else, but in a small rural Australian town working as a GP, and of course attached to a hospital with a generalist role.”

Dr Sunil has recently received his Advanced Standing Certificate from the AMC has lodged his application for general registration.

Like to know more about ACRRM's Competent Authority Pathway? 

For more information on the Competent Authority Pathway, or other AMC-accredited pathways available to international medical graduates through the Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine, please visit the IMG Program page of the ACRRM website.